How Does Stevenson Intend His Readers to Respond to Dr Jekyll and Mr :: English Literature

How Does Stevenson Intend His Readers to Respond to Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde? What Methods Does He Use to Bring About These Responses? Robert Lewis (later changed to ‘Louis’) Stevenson was born in Edinburgh November 13th 1850, into an engineering family. Although he had been plagued with illness all his life, after inheriting tuberculosis from his mother, he enrolled at Edinburgh University to study engineering, to follow in his successful father’s footsteps. However he abandoned that road of studies and swapped to law, where he ‘passed advocate,’ although he had the education to practise law he did not follow that either, because by this time he had realised that he could and would write instead. To expand his horizons he would visit France in the summer to be within the company of other artists, both painters and writers. And his first publication was called ‘Roads,’ which was within a series of publications, all works about travelling. His first truly successful piece was ‘Treasure Island’ released in 1883, which truly launched his career. Later in 1886 he released ‘Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde’ which was also a huge success, as it was so controversial and faced things that most people were too scared to write about. This controversial behaviour had begun when he was a young man by denying his faith, much to the surprise of his strongly protestant parents, he ended up leading a bohemian life. Stevenson’s experiences through life greatly effected his works, such as in ‘Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde’ the scene is set in London, yet based a lot on Edinburgh, the luxurious and grand main city, and the dirty, grimy, back street, underground scene as well. He used this to create an effect on the reader, and to create the response that he wanted. Stevenson used themes throughout the book, and there are a large number of them, running the course of it, that influence greatly the response the reader has to ‘Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde’, and also reflects themes running through society at the time. Some of the most prominent themes being the parable of good versus evil, satanical references and religion that intertwines throughout. ‘If I ever read Satan’s signature upon a face, it on that of your new friend Mr Hyde.’ Mr Utterson says that, oddly, to himself about Mr Hyde after refereeing to Mr Hyde’s unnameable malformations; the use of ‘Satan’ means that although Mr Hyde has nothing especially wrong with him facially or physically, his deformity is in his soul, in his evilness. People sense his dark nature and reflect it in how they view him. This gives